Rotten Apple: Right to Repair Roundup • Hacker News Board

Re: Rotten Apple: Right to Repair Roundup

#41

Post by temporaryvector » Mon, Aug 12, 2019, 5:46 AM UTC

ChickeNES wrote: post #26

bubblethink wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>You're going to want to know if it has OEM parts. But the message is triggered even if you insert an Apple part. So you would want to know if the phone was blessed by an apple genius when you buy/sell ? It's surprising the lengths people go through to defend these asinine decisions. I don't even care about Apple, but the problem is that everyone will follow suit since the rest of the industry lacks any sort of visio…

That's to prevent people from taking old batteries and modifying them to appear new. >So you would want to know if the phone was blessed by an apple genius when you buy/sell ? Very much so, I don't want my phone catching fire in my pocket or while charging, or people with little technical knowledge being scammed. Would you want to know if the home you were buying was wired by a licensed electrician, designed by a lic…

>Would you want to know if the home you were buying was wired by a licensed electrician

No, not really. I'd want it inspected, of course, but that's about it. Same with buying used cars. If the house wiring or my used car fucks ups, I'm safe in the knowledge that I can just hire someone to fix it for a reasonable price, and I can be reasonably confident that they'll do a decent job because the knowledge and the parts to fix it are freely available to anyone.

>designed by a licensed engineer, etc?

Maybe, but then designing a product is different than repairing an already designed product. We also have regulations for that kind of thing, so even if I have no idea who designed the house, I can be fairly confident that it's going to be fine because the house was built in the first place, and as before, I can also have it inspected and repaired if something is wrong.

Nothing of this is new, people have been going through the same shit for a couple of centuries now, we went through it with cars and appliances earlier in the last century. Don't let Apple and other electronic manufactures convince you that they're somehow special or different. It's not arcane magic and these problems are not unsolvable. They're just not willing to solve them in a way that's not user-hostile because they have not real incentive to do so.

Re: Rotten Apple: Right to Repair Roundup

#42

Post by masonic » Mon, Aug 12, 2019, 5:48 AM UTC

GeekyBear wrote: post #30

thedevilslawyer wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except where the error is still displayed even when you transfer in an apple original battery from another phone.

Legitimate parts that fail quality control testing in China have a way of "falling off the truck" onto the loading dock of the fulfillment center used by unscrupulous third party vendors instead of being destroyed.

... which reflects Apple not policing their supply chain.

Re: Rotten Apple: Right to Repair Roundup

#43

Post by lallysingh » Mon, Aug 12, 2019, 5:48 AM UTC

kemayo wrote: post #8

godelski wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree with this sentiment. You mention Rossmann. Anyone that watches his channel knows that Apple purposefully makes things hard to repair. Things could be easier if they wanted them to be. But it's clear that Apple doesn't want devices repaired. See Rossmann talk about prices and how often the genius bar just suggests replacement. As for third party repair, it isn't Apples fault if a third party repairs a phone…

> As for third party repair, it isn't Apples fault if a third party repairs a phone incorrectly. What does this argument even mean? It's 100% not their fault if someone else gets it wrong, it's true. But modern phones are complicated devices -- if you get your battery replaced poorly, and a month later your phone dies because the case was resealed incorrectly which compromised the water resistance and something got d…

It's not that, look at the timing. New iPhone sales are drying up. The old phones are good enough except for battery wear. So, why not force them into Apple Stores to try and upsell them, especially when getting the phone company to finance it?

$60-100 for a battery replacement today, or... $20 (a month) for a shiny new phone.

Re: Rotten Apple: Right to Repair Roundup

#44

Post by ChickeNES » Mon, Aug 12, 2019, 5:49 AM UTC

bubblethink wrote: post #29

ChickeNES wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's to prevent people from taking old batteries and modifying them to appear new. >So you would want to know if the phone was blessed by an apple genius when you buy/sell ? Very much so, I don't want my phone catching fire in my pocket or while charging, or people with little technical knowledge being scammed. Would you want to know if the home you were buying was wired by a licensed electrician, designed by a lic…

>That's to prevent people from taking old batteries and modifying them to appear new. But the phone is old. That is known. You are buying/selling an old phone which has old parts. Whether the old part was genius blessed or not is of little concern as long as it is a genuine part. It is common knowledge that batteries age and that is implied when you buy an old device. If you are unhappy with that, ask for user replac…

>Whether the old part was genius blessed or not is of little concern as long as it is a genuine part.

How do you know it's a genuine part? Maybe even the seller truly believes it is a genuine battery, but counterfeits getting into a supply chain is common unless very tightly controlled.

Re: Rotten Apple: Right to Repair Roundup

#45

Post by kemayo » Mon, Aug 12, 2019, 5:53 AM UTC

godelski wrote: post #36

kemayo wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> As for third party repair, it isn't Apples fault if a third party repairs a phone incorrectly. What does this argument even mean? It's 100% not their fault if someone else gets it wrong, it's true. But modern phones are complicated devices -- if you get your battery replaced poorly, and a month later your phone dies because the case was resealed incorrectly which compromised the water resistance and something got d…

The basis of your argument is that repair is too complicated and requires extremely specific and specialized training. Repairing a phone isn't more complicated than repairing a car (I'd argue a car is harder to repair). So unless you think otherwise AND you think that it is so complicated that only Apple can teach it, then your argument doesn't hold. If people CAN learn the skill of repair (seriously, give me a good…

I think you’re overstating Apple’s actions here.

Specifically: Apple isn’t requiring authorized repairs. It’s displaying a warning fairly deep in the Settings app if your phone has received unauthorized repairs. That’s the consumer benefit I spoke of — being able to check for that.

I’d be very opposed if Apple was actually implementing a “lock”. You should be free to get your device repaired wherever you want.

I’d also like it if Apple adjusted this warning a bit. It’s currently the generic “your battery may need service” message. A more specific message detailing the not-an-authorized-repair situation would be more apt. Still, for now it works — if you’re getting your phone repaired yourself then the shop can warn you about it so you won’t be misled, and if you’re buying a used phone then you can know it’s not-mint.

Re: Rotten Apple: Right to Repair Roundup

#46

Post by flukus » Mon, Aug 12, 2019, 5:58 AM UTC

kemayo wrote: post #11

> By activating a dormant software lock on their newest iPhones, Apple is effectively announcing a drastic new policy: only Apple batteries can go in iPhones, and only they can install them. I really dislike the phrasing attached to this story. It's not a lock: a third party installed battery still works , the phone isn't refusing to start up until you go to an Apple Store and have an authentic Apple(tm) battery inst…

> Given the existence of refurbishment scams, where substandard parts are put into old phones to make them look good briefly, I can understand where Apple is coming from on this point.

Last I checked apple did not make parts available to third party repairers, at least without signing on to some draconian anti-consumer agreements. If they were really interested in protecting consumers from counterfeits then they'd be doing more to make genuine apple parts available and doing less to limit third party repairs.

Re: Rotten Apple: Right to Repair Roundup

#47

Post by pjmlp » Mon, Aug 12, 2019, 6:07 AM UTC

sjwright wrote: post #10

viraptor wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I see the reason why Apple would find limiting third parties useful, but: > Apple could, by all means, make the process easier, cheaper, and more idiot-proof, but that would require engineering efforts. This is a bit silly. Not only are they already spending lots of money on (purposefully) engineering in repair-hostile way, they also have very high markup on their hardware. Let's not feel bad for poor Apple in this c…

Nobody is feeling bad for Apple, but I do think it's ridiculous how we talk about what Apple does as if the majority of their competitors aren't doing exactly the same things. Looked inside a Microsoft Surface product recently? It's just like with the criticisms of working conditions at the Chinese/Foxconn iPhone factories. The same factories make Xboxes, Playstations and thousands of other devices that we all buy wi…

Just like there are things that people punch Microsoft, Oracle or IBM for, yet everyone else on the same league dances to the same music.

Re: Rotten Apple: Right to Repair Roundup

#48

Post by ChickeNES » Mon, Aug 12, 2019, 6:11 AM UTC

temporaryvector wrote: post #41

ChickeNES wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's to prevent people from taking old batteries and modifying them to appear new. >So you would want to know if the phone was blessed by an apple genius when you buy/sell ? Very much so, I don't want my phone catching fire in my pocket or while charging, or people with little technical knowledge being scammed. Would you want to know if the home you were buying was wired by a licensed electrician, designed by a lic…

>Would you want to know if the home you were buying was wired by a licensed electrician No, not really. I'd want it inspected, of course, but that's about it. Same with buying used cars. If the house wiring or my used car fucks ups, I'm safe in the knowledge that I can just hire someone to fix it for a reasonable price, and I can be reasonably confident that they'll do a decent job because the knowledge and the parts…

I think you miss my point. The average person just wants their phone fixed, not to be able to fix it themselves. And they want to have confidence it was done right.

Also, a fun fact: an iPhone XR replacement battery is $80USD from iFixit (the only vendor I'd trust) vs $69 for out-of-warranty replacement from Apple themselves, labor included.

Re: Rotten Apple: Right to Repair Roundup

#49

Post by viraptor » Mon, Aug 12, 2019, 6:13 AM UTC

sjwright wrote: post #25

viraptor wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They do price themselves higher and praise their design though. I'm all for exposing every device/company doing anti-repair stuff. But I'm also happy to start with those having most expensive devices. (if a $1200 professional laptop is not repairable, we have a problem)

Apple devices are rarely more than 10-20% more expensive than its like-for-like competitors. And it's not like they're entirely the same cheap OEM plastic crap with a different logo silkscreened on the front. Apple's investments in mobile CPU design. Apple's laptop chassis engineering. These aren't products that are ever going to compete in the budget space. Meanwhile if you think Samsung and Microsoft and Google and…

You're bringing up how much Apple already spend on custom engineering. I agree - and that's why they should be called out as one of the first. And if people think Apple praises their design more - same. Repairability should be connected to good design.

Also, if I'm in the PC environment, I can get a different repairable PC. If I'm in Mac environment... ?

Re: Rotten Apple: Right to Repair Roundup

#50

Post by bubblethink » Mon, Aug 12, 2019, 6:18 AM UTC

ChickeNES wrote: post #44

bubblethink wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>That's to prevent people from taking old batteries and modifying them to appear new. But the phone is old. That is known. You are buying/selling an old phone which has old parts. Whether the old part was genius blessed or not is of little concern as long as it is a genuine part. It is common knowledge that batteries age and that is implied when you buy an old device. If you are unhappy with that, ask for user replac…

>Whether the old part was genius blessed or not is of little concern as long as it is a genuine part. How do you know it's a genuine part? Maybe even the seller truly believes it is a genuine battery, but counterfeits getting into a supply chain is common unless very tightly controlled.

Battery and other checks have existed forever. Even my ancient thinkpad does it, and lenovo/ibm are kings of whitelists. They've been nickle and diming people for a few decades now. Long before the iphone existed. That's not what is being discussed. This goes a step further and requires an apple store employee to sell and insert the battery. That's how your freedoms erode. Slowly, and in the name of safety/security.